In the past, various types of machines have been known as the paper-sheet counting machine adapted for counting the paper sheets, such as the banknotes, checks and the like. For instance, a banknote counting machine disclosed in JP2600100Y2 is provided for setting a plurality of banknotes in a stacked condition on a placing unit (e.g., a hopper), then feeding and inserting each banknote located at the lowest position of the banknotes into a space between a pair of gate units, one by one, by using a feeding unit, such as a feed roller or the like, provided at a bottom part of the placing unit, thereby separating such banknotes, one by one, and feeding each separated banknote downward, via a passage, and further feeding it into a space between two vanes of a stacking wheel located in the middle of the passage. Thereafter, each banknote received between the two vanes is thrown off therefrom, downward onto a stacking unit, while being turned round with rotation of the stacking wheel, and then arranged in the stacking unit. Further, in the banknote counting machine disclosed in JP2600100Y2, a sensor is provided for counting the number of the banknotes passing through this sensor, before such banknotes reach the stacking wheel.
Further, in JP3537697B and JP3741893B, a banknote processing machine provided for recognizing each banknote and then sorting the recognized banknote, based on each recognition result thereof, is disclosed. In such a banknote processing machine, a plurality of stacking units (or stackers) are provided for respectively receiving the banknotes that have been respectively sorted for each corresponding denomination of money and then fed to the stacking units. In this case, a shutter is provided to each stacker. This shutter serves to selectively close an opening of each stacking unit, in order to prevent access of an operator to the stacking unit.